Mind your manners, app.

Imagine this. After battling crowds of screaming kids, long queues, and during something that’s starting to seem more like a dark night of the soul than a happy day at the mall, you finally find a shirt that looks perfect.

Professional, still casual — not even a hint of sloppy. The color looks great, this might be the day when the girl from HR actually stops teasing you for always wearing black. You pick it from the hanger, head out to the dressing room. Magic is in the air.

But wait — a man slides in from your right, firmly raising his palm, stopping you mid-air.

“Stop right there ma’am”

Sigh.

“We need you to quickly sign this” waving a bunch of papers dangerously close to your face “ .. to agree on all of our terms and conditions, and before you step into this room, we’re going to run a credit check, just to make sure you’re able to… pay …. whatever it is you’re holding there in your hand”.

“But I just want to.. my chance to .. HR .. girl will.. ”

Stern face.

“Uhu. Sign this please.”

If you’re anything like me — chances are you’d drop your shirt, forget about pleasing HR, and back out of there as fast as possible — wondering if you’re going to find yourself in an embarrassing youtube video anytime soon.

Your apps need to be socially smooth

You probably wouldn’t hire a shop assistant who kept making this kind trouble for your customers, so why let your digital services behave in this way?

Like having access to a phone isn’t enough, requiring additional information — and a credit check — when all I want is to save my shirts in a wish-list, pretend to think the purchase over, come back later, buy all of them and just hand over my money, is not anything less than rude.

As a general rule — don’t ask for anything in your digital channels that your semi-nicest member of staff wouldn’t be able to ask in store.

Behind every screen is a person. 
Don’t forget that.

Zalando ❤ credit check.